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www.papakuracourier.co.nz Wednesday, March 9, 2011
QUAKE BRIEF: HOW PREPARED IS AUCKLAND?
By PAT BOOTH What if?
What if?
KOBE 1995:
THE PAIN
SUPERCITY:
LESSONS
Some answers on P2-3
TELL Auckland to plan for
the worst.
The advice came from
Takeo Ohara who lived
through the terrible 1995
Kobe quake and, as executive
director of his city s research
institute for regional plan-
ning, oversaw the recovery.
There are differences in
scale -- Kobe lost 6279 dead
(and recovered all but two of
their bodies). Within 20
seconds, 34,000 were injured,
nearly 200,000 homes were
destroyed or damaged, a
million families were without
power, water, gas and sewer-
age. The city shook through
700 aftershocks in the first 24
hours.
Kobe moved 20 million tons
of rubble and spent $10
billion rebuilding its con-
tainer port, reconnecting
300,000 telephones, repairing
and replacing its two wrecked
expressways and the rail that
carried the famous Shinkan-
sen bullet trains. It also put
up nearly 50,000 temporary
housing units.
I was in the region during
the quake and flew back 12
months later to see the recov-
ery and to question Takeo
Ohara on the lessons for
Auckland.
If the demolition of Christ-
church doesn t match those
terrible figures, the advice he
gave Auckland and which I
repeated in this and other
Suburban Newspapers pub-
lications 15 years ago still
stands.
Question: What are the
early lessons from Christ-
church that we must now
take into account urgently?
A study of likely disaster
outcomes in Auckland started
in 1996. It was scheduled to
take four years to finish.
Questions: What was the
outcome and what has been
done since? Will the Christ-
church experience lead to
change?
Now Auckland supercity
boundaries take in former
local bodies that previously
had their own emergency
plans.
Question: The new head-
quarters for disasters is in
Pitt St. Experienced emerg-
ency workers have criticised
the shutdown of local area
headquarters in Manukau,
the North Shore and Waita-
kere. Have those worries
been allayed?
Kobe s motorway system
collapsed. One log jam on the
city s roads a few days after
the quake trapped thousands
in cars which could not move
for more than 12 hours.
Questions: What plans are
there to provide long-term
bypasses while Auckland
motorways are repaired?
How safe are Auckland s
bridges? What about the
essential service pipes
hitched to their spans?
Some of Kobe s hospitals
went into emergency mode
but played no part in the first
stages of disaster because
they were cut off behind a
highly damaged roading sys-
tem. What has been done to
counter that happening here?
Christchurch could lose a
thousand CBD buildings.
Wellington has that many
needing urgent earthquake
strengthening. How many in
Auckland are listed as poten-
tially dangerous ?
The building code -- as I
understand it from a Welling-
ton survey in the Dominion-
Post:
There was no code until
1935 but buildings given the
equivalent of the Christ-
church green sticker as safe
and usable then would not
qualify as safe now.
Later buildings which
rated 100 percent compliant
under 1965 rules would now
rate a marginal 34 percent.
The types assessed have
apparently also changed.
Before a new code in 2004,
only buildings built from
unreinforced masonry were
assessed -- now all buildings
can be scrutinised.
The Wellington survey says
that since the 2004 Building
Act changed the criteria, it s
up to councils to identify
earthquake risk and issue
notices to owners to
strengthen or demolish.
Question: How many build-
ings in the supercity have got
an implied but not stated red
sticker hanging over them
and what s been done about
them?
Canterbury earthquake
scientists didn t know their
two dangerous fault lines
existed.
So what do we know about
what lies under Auckland ?
6279
Dead
34,000
Injured
200,000
Homes destroyed
700
Aftershocks
1 million
Families with no
water and power
Disaster HQ
No local area branches
Motorways
Long-term bypasses?
Bridges
How safe are they?
Building code
New criteria needed